THE MEDIA BUSINESS: ADVERTISING

THE MEDIA BUSINESS: ADVERTISING; Commercial Cartoon Furor Grows

By STUART ELLIOTT

Published: March 5, 1992

In the latest skirmish over marketing to children, a coalition of advocacy organizations is seeking to block a proposed television show that would star Chester Cheetah, an animated character originally intended to sell snack food.

They are concerned that there will be a rush of similar characters from ads into programs. Indeed, there are also plans for a syndicated cartoon series that would star Cheesasaurus Rex, a cheese-colored dinosaur that appears in advertising for Kraft Macaroni and Cheese Dinner.

Seven organizations, including Action for Children's Television and the Center for Science in the Public Interest, will file a petition in Washington today with the Federal Communications Commission. They will ask for a declaratory ruling that the show, titled "Yo! It's the Chester Cheetah Show!," would be no more than a "program-length commercial."

Though the debate over the boundaries of propriety in programming and advertising aimed at children has raged for decades, this contretemps marks a new turn.

Chester Cheetah -- an animated beast that sells Cheetos, a cheese-flavored snack made by Frito-Lay Inc. -- has become the demon symbol for children's advocacy groups in the same way that Joe Camel, the cartoon animal in Camel cigarette advertising, has become the epitome of evil for those opposed to smoking among the young.

Here, the organizations contend that it is exploitative and improper for a character like Chester Cheetah, created in 1986 by the DDB Needham Worldwide advertising agency expressly to sell products, to cross over into the world of entertainment.

They were also furious in December, when Ronald McDonald, the clown character who appears in advertising aimed at children for the McDonald's Corporation, played host for CBS's first "Ronald McDonald Family Theater" special, called "The Wish That Changed Christmas." (CBS said the program complied with all network and F.C.C. policies.)

The "Chester Cheetah Show" has been under development at the Fox Broadcasting Company for possible inclusion in the fall 1992 schedule as a Saturday morning cartoon on the Fox Children's Network.

"His only previous television appearances," the petition said, "indeed his entire existence, have been in traditional commercial spots designed to sell a product." That renders any program in which such a character would be featured the equivalent of a "program-length commercial," the petition added, and thus "fails to strictly separate programming material from commercial matter," as required under F.C.C. regulations.

The petition marks the first time that Action for Children's Television "has moved in on something before it became a program," Peggy Charren, the organization's president, said in a telephone interview yesterday from Cambridge, Mass. She continued, "But we thought: 'This isn't a program. It's an ad.' "

Advertising and marketing executives responsible for the trend counter that what they do is not significantly different from using classic characters like Mickey Mouse, Babar and Curious George, which originated in books or films, to sell dolls, toys or other products.

"Yes, he's coming from the opposite direction," Tod MacKenzie, a spokesman for Frito-Lay in Dallas, said of Chester Cheetah, "and started his life as a spokesperson."

"But there's little on now that hasn't gone to the commercial side," he added. "If we can come up with a worthwhile program, offering something informative and entertaining, is that necessarily bad?"

Margaret Loesch, president of the Fox Children's Network in Los Angeles, the largest children's commercial television network, disputed the advocates' objections.

"A child doesn't know if a character was created first for a comic book or a book or a toy or a logo," she said. "And the fact that a Mickey Mouse cartoon sells Disneyland and toys and books is not an issue? That's absurd."

Ms. Loesch added that "extended and protracted negotiations" over the project were continuing and that no agreement had yet been reached. One aspect prolonging those discussions, she said, has been Fox's "concern that we have a good product that doesn't show us to be irresponsible broadcasters."

"It's not our goal to sell Frito-Lay products," she said. Not only would Fox comply with F.C.C. policies and exclude Cheetos spots from the show, she added, but the network would also "be willing not to run Cheetos commercials anywhere on our Saturday-morning schedule."

In television commercials and in ads on the backs of Cheetos packages, Chester Cheetah -- a self-described "hip kitty," designed to appeal to the young males who most ardently devour salty snacks -- says, "I'm a cool dude in a loose mood." His routine is that his blase behavior lasts only until he sees Cheetos, when, he says, "my cool turns to drool while my snout and eyeballs pop out."

Chester Cheetah's popularity was underscored last year, when Frito-Lay introduced a variety of Cheetos, called Cheetos Paws, inspired by him. The character also appears on that product's packaging.

"Some of the most lovable characters around come from the world of commerce," said John Frierson, a principal in Frierson Mee & Herman, a New York agency specializing in toy advertising.

Among examples he cited were the California Raisins, which originated in advertising for the California Raisin Advisory Board and subsequently appeared in animated television specials and sold products like T-shirts and figurines.

Photo: Planned cartoon shows based on characters like Kraft's Cheesasaurus Rex and Cheetos Chester Cheetah are under fire. (Naum Kazhdan/The New York Times)